An Arizona lobbyist has agreed to a $5,000 fine in connection with an illegal $300 donation to the 2005 campaign of former San Diego Mayor Jerry Sanders. according to the state political watchdog agency.

The Fair Political Practices Commission and the lobbyist, Gary Husk, have agreed to settle a single charge of violating campaign finance laws.

The commission said that in September 2005 Husk, who was president of a lobbying firm in Phoenix, asked an employee to donate $300 to Sanders’ campaign, and gave him a check for that amount.

A month later the lobbying firm held a fundraising breakfast for Sanders at its Phoenix offices. The next day the employee gave $300 to the Sanders campaign using the money Husk had given him earlier, the commission said. The commission said that neither Husk nor the employee told the campaign the true source of the funds.

Both that donation and a second, legal donation of $300 from Husk himself were reported on Sanders’s campaign finance reports. The limit per individual donor was $300.

Sanders was elected mayor a month later.

Husk told U-T Watchdog on Monday that he knew Sanders when he worked as a federal prosecutor in San Diego, when Sanders was the San Diego police chief, and respected and supported him. That’s why he held the fundraiser.

He said he had no lobbying interest in the city at the time. A check of city records confirmed that his firm has not been registered with the city as a lobbyist since 2003.

Husk pleaded guilty earlier this year in Arizona to a single misdemeanor charge of violating that state’s campaign finance laws and paid a $30,000 fine. He was accused of using his lobbying firm’s money to reimburse staff members who made campaign contributions to political campaigns, including that for Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer. The charge was similar to the one he admitted to Monday in California.

The state commission learned of the violation from Arizona authorities who investigated Husk, an FPPC spokesman said.

The settlement will not be final until the commission approves it on July 17.